Feb 27, 2011

The aroma that fills your kitchen while cooking this Cuban rice dish will make you want to pump up the salsa music and grab a mojito!

Rice and black beans cook together in this flavorful dish, which gives the rice it's black color. In addition it's cooked with peppers, onions, garlic, cumin and bay leaf. Not only is the dish delicious, it's also high in fiber, protein, anti-oxidants, it's low fat, vegan, and gluten-free. Win win!!

This is very filling thanks to the beans. You cans enjoy this as a vegetarian main dish with a salad, or great as a side dish with steak, chicken or pork. Try this with Chicken Sabroso or Slow Cooked Pernil, you won't be sorry!

I ate this with an avocado papaya salad (recipe coming) and I was thoroughly satisfied, I didn't miss the meat!

White rice is typically used in this dish, I've never had it with brown rice but I'm sure it would be delicious for those of you who prefer brown - you may have to adjust the liquid and cooking time. You can of course use your own cooked beans from dried beans if you prefer not to used canned. This recipe does not recommend you drain the beans, the liquid is what gives the rice the black color. For those of you who must drain the beans, be sure to fill the can back with water so it won't be too dry.

In a heavy medium sized pot, heat oil on medium heat. Add onions, peppers and garlic and saute until soft, about 4-5 minutes.

Add rice, beans, water, cumin, bay leaf, oregano and salt and pepper.

Simmer on medium-low heat, stirring occasionally, until the rice absorbs most of the water and just barely skims the top of the rice.

Cover, reduce heat to low, and simmer 20 minute (don't peek). Make sure you have a good seal on your cover, the steam cooks the rice. After 20 minutes, shut flame off and let it sit, covered another 5 minutes (don't open the lid).

103 comments
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Seriously Gina, you are AMAZING! I stumbled onto this site a few months ago when my fiancee' and I started weight watchers. EVERYTHING we have tried has been SO good! He's lost 20, and I've lost 12, thanks to you keeping us on track with these awesome recipes. I have one question about your web-site. Is there an easy way to do a search? Right now I sort of click on a similar recipe and let it take me to different places. When I use the side panel of "Side Dishes" (or others) it only gives me a few. Where's ALL of your recipes? - Kristy Fox, Upstate NY

I was so happy to find this recipe this morning. I opened my refrigerator this morning to find nothing much but a huge red pepper. I had onions in my pantry and black beans in the cabinet. This was delicious and so easy to make. My husband loved it too! As always thanks for sharing.

Too funny and freaky. I just bookmarked your pernil recipe last night to make this next weekend while we're out hiking (we've made a bunch of your recipes), and was thinking that I can't believe you haven't ever posted a congri recipe. I love congri, and order it every time I go out for Cuban food.

Thanks! Now our meal for Saturday is complete: pernil, congri and a tropical fruit salad.

Today was my 1st visit to your site. Your recipes and photos look wonderful. I'd like to try them. For health reasons, I am on a sodium restricted diet. Is there any chance you could include sodium content along with the other nutritional values?

I made this tonight!! It was delicious!! but, I used brown rice, didn't have any white, had to add some extra water and got only 3.5 cups, increasing the points to 9!! EEK!! Did I do something wrong? Thanks!!

I made this tonight with brown rice and a 19 oz can of black beans. I used chicken broth for 1 c of water, and used a full second cup of water. I let it cook, covered, for 50 minutes and sit for 10 minutes off the heat. It was a touch too soupy - I think next time I'll use only 1.5c liquid when using 19oz of beans. But it was very tasty, and a great side dish with your Peruvian Roast chicken - which was also delicious. Thanks Gina, love your recipes!

Mara- white rice gets really fluffy when cooks, it expands, changing the recipe can always result in changes to texture, servings, etc. Personally I've only made this with white. Brown rice is not common in Cuban cuisine.

Hi Gina, thanks for all of your fabulous recipes! Being cuban, this is my specialty and a must have at every family function. I make it with parboiled rice and I pour in some Goya mojo marinade while the beans are cooking before the rice absorbs the liquid...it won't affect the calories and it's amazing! Keep those great recipes coming Love ya!

In Central America this dish is called gallo pinto. It it made almost the same way as your recipe for arroz congri with a few variations. In Costa Rica, for example, the gallo pinto is eaten at breakfast and is made with beans and DAY OLD rice. Normally beans are made by the bucketful on Sunday to last all week and then every morning rice is made for lunches and dinner. So in the morning someone would take the beans from the large pot and yesterdays left over rice and turn it into breakfast. I used to have a GIANT mound of it with a friend egg on top served with bread. O.M.G. You NEED to try it, it's SO good. I don't know if that makes it more unhealthy but it is definitely a way to use up extra arroz congri if you have it!

p.s. I'm new to the site but my bf and I are on a major diet right now so finding yummy and health food is a must! Thanks for the great recipes.

Thanks for suggesting the fried egg on top! I've never thought about that or even heard of it before--maybe because I'm not latina? I made this arroz congri for supper last night with pernil, but this morning I fried up some eggs and my hubby and I had them on top of some of the leftover rice. It IS delicious! Love this recipe.

Thanks Amy! I love the sound of your story, I pictured myself there in the lush rain forest. By the way, I love a sunny side egg over rice, it's totally a Latin thing! I would eat this for dinner for a very low cost meal. In Colombia they do something similar with left overs, yum.

This was deeeeeeeeelicious! I served it with your Cuban Pork and turnip greens. OMG...filling and so, so, so good. One thing, though...when I ran the NI through the tracker doohickey, it came out to 6 points, P+, not 5.

Made this tonight....omg so good. Never have eaten Cuban food I decided to give it a try. Trying to eat more beans thanks to high cholesterol. Wow this was amazing. Already have the left overs packed for lunch. And so easy too and quick. Def something that will be made weekly. You are amazing Gina. I thank you so much.

I made the Barbacoa Pork this week, which was fantastic and a big hit with the family, and I made the Arroz Congri as well. I followed the recipe word for word, and while not terrible, we found it VERY bland. We love our rice and beans, but this was nothing at all like what we've eaten before :(

Made this tonight and paired it with the peruvian chicken (I shredded mine and tossed on top) and aji verde sauce. SOOOO GOOD!!!! My boyfriend announced that - hands down - this is the best meal I've ever made. I think I agree with him. THANK YOU!

Gina: I really want to make this but I hate the taste of undrained/unrinsed black beans. If I rinse and drain them and add a little chicken broth and salt to the pot, do you think that would be a reasonable solution?

Hi Gina,I have made several of your recipes and all have been a hit at my house. I followed this one exactly but for some reason my rice was more of a greyish color rather than brown like yours. My boyfriend took one look and gobbled it all up. Which made me feel great but now that I am looking at your post for the second time, my rice looks a little different in color. Could you tell me why this happened?

I made this recipe yesterday. My family loved it! I used brown rice, so the cooking time was about 40 min. It was excellent! And it is a great way to use up any peppers from the garden. I love this site! Everything I have made is always good! And the pictures are beautiful! Thanks!!

Just discovered your website and have made a few things already and love them all. I made this, but used quinoa instead of rice and also threw in fresh cilantro (like I do when I make spanish rice). I have to tell you, it came out perfectly - I also used 1.5cups of chicken broth instead of water. Thanks for the idea, went great w/your Pernil recipe! Nikki

First off..im soooo glad i found this website...being on weight watchers its been hard to find yummy low point recipes.....and i was raised on Cuban food..so i had the full fat version...this Congri was Delish!!! My husband and son enjoyed it aswell i paired it w/ your pollo sabroso....also very good....if all of your recipes are this yummy... ill do weight watchers forvever;-)

I just love your website and have a binder full of your recipes. I finally got around to making this one with brown rice. It just had to be cooked a little longer because of the brown rice but definitely a keeper. Thank you Gina!

I LOOOOOOOOOOOOVE this recipe! I made it tonight for the first time and paired it with the pollo sabroso... OMG. I made the roasted potatoes with chicken sausage (I used lean sweet italian turkey sausage) a couple of days ago and it was awesome as well. My kids even liked it. Girl, you are a HIT! I love this website.

I just got done eating this for dinner. It was yummy but I did a few things different. First I don't think I added enough salt while it cooked; so we had to add some to the rice on our plates. I found this was missing a pop of flavor so I added some lime juice and then for a kick of spice I drizzled some sriracha sauce! It was very tasty by the end. I served some caribbean jerk seasoned chicken thighs on the side.

I tasted the dish before the water boiled and I found it bit bland as well. I searched online and found authentic recipes which require more seasoning. Try these additions to make the dish more flavorful. I added more garlic, 1 1/2 tsp of salt, 2 tsp of cumin, 1/2 tsp chili powder and 1/2 tsp of oregeno.

I will be eating this for lunch accompanied with a nice side of vegetables.

My thoughts exactly. I tried doing it on the stove top and failed miserably...as I always tend to do when I try cooking rice that way. The rice cooker is my only hope! I'm going to try it. I'll let you know how it turns out!

I made this tonight, thinking it would be just for my family... Then the in-laws showed up. I worried this wouldn't be enough, as I didn't double the recipe, but there was plenty, and everyone helped themselves. Paired with a steak salad and garlic-toasted rolls, this was fabulous, AND they think I can cook! Thanks!

i made this today ahead of time as a side dish for workweek meals as i have been grilling a lot lately. i snuck a taste and let me tell you it was delicious. the best beans and rice i have ever had!!! this will be on my meal rotation on a regular basis along with my other favorites from this site(spinach lasagna rolls, chicken parm).

Made this tonight and it was delicious! I love black beans, and rice is a very common side dish in our house so this was just perfect! I swapped the white rice for brown rice and it turned out great. It was all I had on hand and was worried I wouldn't be able to get it to turn out right, but the only change necessary was letting it simmer a little while longer (about 40 minutes). I will definitely be making this again soon. :)

Red beans cooked with white white rice is arroz junto con abichuelas, punto. Or the way u make it is Jamaican rice ( which is about the same thing as ours!) Different parts in Cuba call congri and make it differently, ( in Santiago is called congri and usually is made with yellow,green and red peppers) just because she doesn't make it your way, doesn't mean you have to question or belittle her knowledge of this dish or her race. :)

What a great site! I'm looking forward to trying more of your recipes. I am a very inexperienced cook and was wondering if you could give me an estimate of how much salt to use in this recipe (I am kind of a disaster at estimating!). Thanks!

I just made this and it really turned out so great. I didn't have black beans so I added kidney beans. Didn't green bell pepper but had red and yellow. Seriously, what a great dish. We like rice with everything so we are going to serve it with some steak.

This recipe turned out so delicious and was very easy to follow. I had given up on rice and beans since I could never get the consistency right, but this was spot on and it looked just like the photo! It was so good that my fiance and I almost ate the entire pot (LOL)

I just made this for the family. My toddler came at me with his dish after scraping it clean and said, "More! More!" I was literally beaming with pride. I made it with brown rice and it took a while to cook, but boy was it good. Best of all--simple, healthy, ingredients. Another AWESOME recipe from Gina. I'm never let down.

I just made this for dinner. I was craving for Cuban rice and beans, and this recipe satisfied my palate. Instead of water, I used low sodium chicken broth. I also added 1 tbs of cider vinegar. I garnished with chopped cilantro and sprinkled a little bit of lime. My kids and my husband loved! Thanks for sharing this yummy recipe!!!

I have used a rice cooker but one made out of clay and has settings for white and brown rice and stew. I sauté the veggies a few minutes and then add the rice for a few minutes, then put all into clay cooker on white rice setting. It usually comes out about right; I use more of each seasoning and use others as well instead of salt

Made this last night. I'm sure it's delicious on it's own but i wanted to make it a one pot meal so I added some ham and a small can of tomato sauce. I doubled the beans. I did not double the rice but I did use brown rice. Since I added the tomato sauce I only used 1 C. of water. It was AMAZING. My son could not stop eating this. Next time I will follow the recipe as directed and try it with the Pernil. I can't wait to try more of your recipes...especially the Latin food. I am an Irish white girl but I LOVE Latin food. Thank you for this website. It will help my husband and I stay on track.

Gina, I've made dozens of your recipes and there has not been a single one we did not love! (Even my husband who thinks he doesn't really like certain ingredients I'm using!) I made this a few nights ago and loved it SO much, that when we ran out today, I decided to make it again for dinner. Craving it! It's cooking now, and we can't wait. I decided to add some extra veggies this time around to stretch it out (celery, carrots etc), and some extra beans (awesome with red kidneys, too!), and my mouth is literally watering! Thank you for your amazing recipes! ~Cara

pro-tip, rinse the rice before placing in. place in a large bowl and cover with water, and drain water. Repeat until water runs clear. This will give the rice a nice, clean feel instead of lumping together in a pudding. Remove the extra starch for a better taste and texture